Trips to abroad, paying for cars and transfer costs of a Cape Town house as well as appointing unqualified family members in crime intelligence are just some of the allegations against former spy boss Richard Mdluli and his family. The NPA says it will not only criminally prosecute alleged looters of state coffins but also force them to hand back their proceeds.

The National Prosecuting Authority’s Asset Forfeiture Unit (NPA AFU) has been granted and served an order to restrain at least R13m on former SAPS Crime Intelligence head, Richard Mdluli, head of Supply Chain Management, Heine Barnard, former SAPS Crime Intelligence CFO, Solomon Lazarus, and others.

The other accused are Mdluli’s former wife, Theresa Lyons, his current wife, Vusiwane Mdluli, John and Heena Appalsami of Daez Trading CC, Barnard’s wife Juanita Barnard and Lazarus’s wife, Sandra Lazarus.

According to the NPA, the restraint is linked to the fraud, theft, and corruption case the accused are facing in the Gauteng High Court.

“The matter pertains to charges of gross abuse of the police crime intelligence slush fund, which ultimately benefited Richard Mdluli and his family.

“They include payment of private trips to China and Singapore, private use of a witness protection house in Boksburg and conversion of this property for his personal use [and] the leasing out of Mdluli’s private townhouse at Gordon Villas in Gordon’s Bay as a safe house to the state and using the monthly rental to pay his bond.

“[Charges also include] paying [Mdluli’s] financing costs owing on his private BMW through an intricate scheme to the detriment of the SAPS, coercing a SAPS supplier into giving Mdluli a special deal on the use and purchase price of a Honda Ballade, paying transfer costs to an attorney on the purchase of a house in Cape Town and having family members, without adequate qualifications or experience, appointed in crime intelligence [as well as] getting them on the payroll and paying their salaries, providing them with motor vehicles and cell phones.

“The offences are alleged to have been committed between 2008 and 2012,” says the NPA.

NPA AFU head, Advocate Ouma Rabaji-Rasethaba, says the prosecutorial body is determined to ensure that not only are those alleged to be corrupt brought to court but that they hand over any illegal benefits back to the state.

“The NPA has a two-pronged strategy for prosecuting those responsible for looting state coffers — through criminal prosecution and by taking away the proceeds of crime through asset forfeiture proceedings.

“We will not allow those who benefited from crime to hold onto the ill-gotten gains, and they must feel that crime does not pay,” Rabaji-Rasethaba says. – SAnews.gov.za